This functions enable you to get a lot of information about PHP itself, e.g. runtime configuration, loaded extensions, version and much more. You'll also find functions to set options for your running PHP. The probably best known function of PHP - phpinfo() - can be found here.
The behaviour of these functions is affected by settings in php.ini.
Table 1. PHP Options/Inf Configuration Options
| Name | Default | Changeable |
|---|---|---|
| assert.active | "1" | PHP_INI_ALL |
| assert.bail | "0" | PHP_INI_ALL |
| assert.warning | "1" | PHP_INI_ALL |
| assert.callback | NULL | PHP_INI_ALL |
| assert.quiet_eval | "0" | PHP_INI_ALL |
| enable_dl | "1" | PHP_INI_SYSTEM |
| max_execution_time | "30" | PHP_INI_ALL |
| magic_quotes_gpc | "1" | PHP_INI_PERDIR|PHP_INI_SYSTEM |
| magic_quotes_runtime | "0" | PHP_INI_ALL |
Here's a short explanation of the configuration directives.
Enable assert() evaluation.
Terminate script execution on failed assertions.
Issue a PHP warning for each failed assertion.
user function to call on failed assertions
Use the current setting of error_reporting() during assertion expression evaluation. If enabled, no errors are shown (implicit error_reporting(0)) while evaluation. If disabled, errors are shown according to the settings of error_reporting()
This directive is really only useful in the Apache module version of PHP. You can turn dynamic loading of PHP extensions with dl() on and off per virtual server or per directory.
The main reason for turning dynamic loading off is security. With dynamic loading, it's possible to ignore all open_basedir restrictions. The default is to allow dynamic loading, except when using safe mode. In safe mode, it's always impossible to use dl().
This sets the maximum time in seconds a script is allowed to run before it is terminated by the parser. This helps prevent poorly written scripts from tying up the server. The default setting is 30.
The maximum execution time is not affected by system calls, the sleep() function, etc. Please see the set_time_limit() function for more details.
You can not change this setting with ini_set() when running in safe mode. The only workaround is to turn off safe mode or by changing the time limit in the php.ini.
Sets the magic_quotes state for GPC (Get/Post/Cookie) operations. When magic_quotes are on, all ' (single-quote), " (double quote), \ (backslash) and NUL's are escaped with a backslash automatically.
Note: If the magic_quotes_sybase directive is also ON it will completely override magic_quotes_gpc. Having both directives enabled means only single quotes are escaped as ''. Double quotes, backslashes and NUL's will remain untouched and unescaped.
See also get_magic_quotes_gpc()
If magic_quotes_runtime is enabled, most functions that return data from any sort of external source including databases and text files will have quotes escaped with a backslash. If magic_quotes_sybase is also on, a single-quote is escaped with a single-quote instead of a backslash.
The constants below are always available as part of the PHP core.
Table 2. Pre-defined phpcredits() constants
| Constant | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
| CREDITS_GROUP | 1 | A list of the core developers |
| CREDITS_GENERAL | 2 | General credits: Language design and concept, PHP 4.0 authors and SAPI module. |
| CREDITS_SAPI | 4 | A list of the server API modules for PHP, and their authors. |
| CREDITS_MODULES | 8 | A list of the extension modules for PHP, and their authors. |
| CREDITS_DOCS | 16 | The credits for the documentation team. |
| CREDITS_FULLPAGE | 32 | Usually used in combination with the other flags. Indicates that the a complete stand-alone HTML page needs to be printed including the information indicated by the other flags. |
| CREDITS_QA | 64 | The credits for the quality assurance team. |
| CREDITS_ALL | -1 | All the credits, equivalent to using: CREDITS_DOCS + CREDITS_GENERAL + CREDITS_GROUP + CREDITS_MODULES + CREDITS_QA CREDITS_FULLPAGE. It generates a complete stand-alone HTML page with the appropriate tags. This is the default value. |
Table 3. phpinfo() constants
| Constant | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
| INFO_GENERAL | 1 | The configuration line, php.ini location, build date, Web Server, System and more. |
| INFO_CREDITS | 2 | PHP 4 Credits. See also phpcredits(). |
| INFO_CONFIGURATION | 4 | Current Local and Master values for php directives. See also ini_get(). |
| INFO_MODULES | 8 | Loaded modules and their respective settings. |
| INFO_ENVIRONMENT | 16 | Environment Variable information that's also available in $_ENV. |
| INFO_VARIABLES | 32 | Shows all predefined variables from EGPCS (Environment, GET, POST, Cookie, Server). |
| INFO_LICENSE | 64 | PHP License information. See also the license faq. |
| INFO_ALL | -1 | Shows all of the above. This is the default value. |